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TidBITS Watchlist: Notable Software Updates for 20 February 2012

Default Folder X 4.4.9 -- St. Clair Software has released Default Folder X 4.4.9, whose marquee change is the capability to add favorite folders via a contextual menu in the Finder. This new release of the popular Open and Save dialog enhancement utility now also supports Automator workflows in Mac OS X 10.7 Lion and will support the next version of Automatic Duck’s Pro Import AE plug-in for After Effects. The update is rounded out by a number of fixes, including a bug that caused applications (notably Sandvox) to crash when they opened URLs, and a problem with Default Folder X forgetting favorite folders on some
networked drives. ($34.95 new, $10 off for TidBITS members, free update, 10.6 MB, release notes)

VLC 2.0 -- VideoLAN has released VLC 2.0 (nicknamed Twoflower), a major release for the free, open-source multimedia framework and player that offers wide support for various video formats. At the user interface level, the new release moves to a completely overhauled single-window design. Under the hood, the update provides faster decoding on multi-core processors, improved decoding for MKV and MOV formats, additional codec compatibility (including ProRes and AVC/Intra), and improved subtitle rendering to better fit the displayed window. It also offers support for Blu-ray playback (though this is noted as “experimental”).
View a lengthy list of features and format compatibility on VideoLAN’s Web site. (Free, 24 MB)

Bookle 1.0.4 -- Stairways Software has released Bookle 1.0.4, the EPUB reader for the Mac that was developed in collaboration between TidBITS’s Adam Engst and Peter Lewis of Stairways Software (see “Introducing Bookle, an EPUB Reader for Mac OS X,” 6 February 2012). This update fixes a small glitch with the initial selection of some books, expands the range of the font size selection to 160 point for those who want really large font sizes, and adds support for invalid EPUBs with unencoded spaces in their table-of-contents references. The new release also defaults to UTF-8 to
fix some character display issues and adds tips to the toolbars for better VoiceOver support. ($9.99 new from the Mac App Store, free update, 2.6 MB)

Airfoil 4.6.5 -- Rogue Amoeba has released Airfoil 4.6.5, which updates the popular network audio streaming app for the Mac with both new and restored features. As with other recent Rogue Amoeba updates, it includes the latest version of the Instant On component (5.0), which can now capture audio from sandboxed applications purchased from the Mac App Store. Plus, Airfoil Speakers can now remotely control playback from several new sources, including Pandoras Box, Musicality, Muse, and Muse Controller’s Pandora player. The update brings back compatibility with capturing video from Netflix in full-screen mode, and also
restores compatibility with Apple Remote and Keyspan remotes in Mac OS X 10.7 Lion. Other updates include the capability to configure pulled audio from input devices in Audio MIDI Setup and the use of the Apple Lossless encoder/decoder for improved audio compression. ($25 new, free update, 9.8 MB, release notes)

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